Abandoning Absolution
by meritt
Summary: Jason Todd clings to his gun. Roy Harper clings to a bottle. A danger to themselves and every bit of Gotham scum within their reach, the two know that they aren't deserving of forgiveness. (Cover by the talented artist Rookblonkorules! Check out her Batfamily fanfiction!)
1. Chapter 1: A Restless Night

The little bit of rain-slicked metal jumped from his hand and into a puddle.

Jason scowled and stooped to pick up the key from his doorstep, gloved fingers scraping the cement as he missed it several times. He squinted through the dark rain, forced himself to focus, and grabbed it. His hands slipped over the wet doorknob several times before he yanked the door open and tripped into his apartment.

He tugged off his helmet and peeled off the domino mask, dropping them onto the couch as he walked towards his room, one hand braced on the greyish wall of the hallway, because it was getting oddly difficult to balance.

It was just a fever. Bruce would never have let him out on the streets like this, but Jason wouldn't let a little fever stop him from cleaning up some of Gotham's scum. Damn whatever Bruce would think. Why couldn't Jason stop thinking about what Bruce would think?

It didn't matter. He was on his own now, independent of Batman's no-kill rule. It was Bruce's fault the criminals kept coming back. Jason needed to be out there as much as possible. He needed to stop them… stop them from hurting people. Too many people had been hurt.

Memories of the past hours flashed behind his eyes: Blood and tissue splattered onto a dirty brick wall behind a small, slumping body… and a man, cured up bloody on the ground, because Jason had been just a few seconds too late… and suddenly, a metal bar swinging at his own head, fast, and Jason got hit three times before he put the man down. It had been a crowbar.

He stepped into his room. The cold light from the window hurt his eyes. It was about 2 am since he was back early, but the streetlights and the light from the building across the street poured into his room and made the drops of rain on the window shine. He fumbled with the blinds until they closed, and dropped himself onto his bed.

His head felt heavy. He tugged off his jacket and his body armor and found proof that Bruce was right all over his skin. Bruises spotted and wrapped around his arms and his chest. As if he hadn't been at this for years. Apparently a little fever was enough to make all his training go to shit.

Didn't matter. He'd just sleep it off. He fell back onto his pillow and cringed at the creaking of his bed. It sounded louder than ever. His eyes drifted shut.

Soon a soft, rasping laughter drifted through the room, and Jason immediately twisted around, reaching fiercely for his gun, but nothing was there. He reached for the knife under his pillow, found nothing, and realized that he couldn't see. He tried to sit up but some invisible force pressed him down. The laughter floated louder, closer, and as the seconds ticked by, Jason swore he felt a breath on his face.

Someone shook him, hands gripping his shoulders like claws, and he found that he was able to jerk away.

He tumbled out of bed, gasping for air in the room that suddenly seemed hot and stuffy. The laughter had stopped. It wasn't real; he was alone.

He pushed himself back up onto his bed, trying to get his frantic breathing under control, to find the dark silhouette of a man sitting there at the end of it. With a strangled cry he sprang back off of the bed and stumbled backwards, reaching for the gun on his night-side table, a small relief flooding through him when his hands closed on the cool, heavy metal. This wasn't a dream, he wasn't helpless- he could raise the gun and shoot.

"Jason," the man said sharply. "Put down the damn gun."

The voice was as familiar as the laughter, or more. Jason's shoulders slumped in relief, because it wasn't _him,_ it was just Bruce. And then he got a hold of himself.

"Bruce?" he yelled, still breathing too quickly as he straightened into an offensive stance. His knuckles were white around the gun. Laughter still echoed in the back of his mind and his hands shook erratically. "What the hell are you doing here? Get out!"

"Jason," Bruce said, more gently this time. Jason cringed at what sounded like pity in his voice. "Put down the gun."

Bruce had woken him up, probably heard him screaming. He bit his lip hard. Had he forgotten to lock the damn door? Had he been that out of it? He didn't lower the gun. He needed something in between himself and Bruce... he needed to be alone, to be safe, independent…

He lost focus as the laughter sounded again, as if it was in the same room as him, as if he was in the room. He didn't let go of the gun. His vision blurred but he could focus on the cold metal in his hands. The sound of laughter stopped abruptly as Bruce stood up, suddenly looming over him.

"I told you-" Jason panted as his mind cleared. "I told you to get the hell- agh!"

Bruce had moved smoothly and quickly and Jason found the gun twisted out of his grasp. He fought the urge to hold his sore wrist, glaring up at Bruce furiously.

"I never would have been able to pull that off so easily when you were Robin," Bruce said, disarming the gun and throwing it behind him, stepping closer to Jason. It clunked on the floor. "And now you're having nightmares. What's going on?"

"You know, I missed the part where that's any of your damned business," Jason spat. He hated the shake in his voice.

"And you went out on patrol like this?" Bruce continued, his disapproval clear. "I'm surprised I didn't find you unconscious in an alley somewhere. Or worse."

"What the hell do you think you're doing here, l-lecturing me like I'm your-" Jason swallowed hard. "Responsibility? I'm not. Not anymore. Not after- Just leave me the hell alone."

"You're my-" Bruce sounded startled, but he cut the sentence off before Jason could. He suddenly turned around and stepped away.

Jason panicked, expecting the laughter to start again any second.

"Wai-I mean, why- why the hell are you here?" he said quickly, before Bruce could vanish over the threshold.

"I came to talk."

To talk? Jason fastened his eyes onto Bruce's face, onto the cowl, but it was impossible to read his expression.

"I came to tell you that you need to come back to the Manor, and you're only proving me right." He gestured at Jason's bruises, visible in the dirty light that filtered through the weak blinds. "You're obviously not taking care of yourself, and if you don't take care of yourself, you can't take care of Gotham."

Jason was silent. He remembered Alfred pestering Bruce with that exact saying time and again when Bruce came home from patrol, insisted that he was perfectly fine, and waved off Alfred's ministrations. But to hear the words from Bruce's mouth... maybe things were different now.

"Your old room is-"

"No." Jason clenched his eyes shut for half a second, aghast at himself for even considering the offer. "That's crazy. Why the hell would I put myself under your authority again? I-I'm doing fine. I'm making an actual permanent difference. I don't- I can't… look where trusting you got me last time."

Bruce's face contorted beneath the cowl. Jason glanced away, and when he looked back, Batman was gone.


	2. Chapter 2: A Bad Idea

Jason scowled and clenched his teeth. He wasn't going back to the Manor. Bruce was stupid to ask.

And now Bruce was gone.

As Jason crossed the room for a T-shirt, it seemed larger and emptier than usual. Dark corners. He wanted to get out of there, quickly, before he heard the laughter again.

The bar was only a few blocks away. Maybe it was a bad idea, but he wasn't going to get a moment of sleep anyway.

He nearly lost his balance as he reached down for the gun Bruce had so arrogantly snatched from him. He reloaded it and shoved it into the back of his belt. The next time someone took it from him, he'd break their damn fingers.

He had his gun, what else did he need? Money. He shoved money into his pocket, shrugged on his leather jacket, pushed his feet into his boots, and left the drafty apartment.

He closed the door behind him quickly, and found himself leaning over with his hands on his knees. A concussion, a fever, some cuts and bruises, so what? He had his gun.

He locked the door with a vengeance. Maybe he should nail a bat to the door. Maybe that would get the message through Bruce's thick skull.

Why wouldn't Bruce and his stupid little gang of Batfreaks stay away from him? He knew what they thought of him. And he wanted to forget about it. He walked quickly towards the bar and felt the grit and crunch of broken glass and gravel under his uneven footsteps.

A cold breeze blew the Gotham stink across his face. It started to rain again, blurring all of the tall, ugly, graffiti-covered buildings into one dilapidated maze. Jason wove through it, passing a few people huddled in doorways, a few drunks, but no one he could punch. He grit his teeth.

The rain made his hair run into his face, and his eyes stung. He blinked rapidly and realized that the black dye was leaking out of the white chunks of his hair. He rubbed at his face, his fingers coming away streaked with black. He swore and sped up, knocking his shoulder into a telephone pole, and as he stumbled back, somebody caught his arm.

Jason tried to wrench his arm away but the attacker held firm. Jason raised his eyebrows. Normally thugs didn't mess with him. But now he wasn't wearing the Hood.

"Listen," a quiet voice commanded. "You're gonna go exactly what I say."

Jason turned slowly so as not to become dizzy, and faced his confronter. His victim.

His mouth spread into a wolfish grin. "Am I?"

The man who had grabbed him had wet blond hair raked down into a ponytail, and was only about Jason's size. He flicked open a switchblade, not a hint of fear in his face.

Jason realized that the man must have taken him for an easy target, just another drunk, with the way his concussion made him walk.

"Give me your money and anything valuable you got on you," the man said. Was the guy dumb enough to expect to win any fight he got into with that pathetic little switchblade? He obviously wasn't trained.

"Go to hell," Jason said, and he reached out, twisting the man's wrist so that the switchblade fell from his fingers and bounced away from his feet.

Bruce had taught him that, taught the move to him, and then used it on him, less than an hour ago. Jason's face contorted in anger at the memory and for a moment he was lost in thought.

Then he remembered he was in the middle of something. His vision, bleary as it was, focused on the man's face, and he frowned when he realized that there was still no trace of fear there. The man was smiling. Jason had a second to wonder what the hell was going on before a baseball bat swung out of nowhere, hitting him in the back of the neck.

Jason doubled forward, without time to be glad that the guy who had been waiting silently behind him had missed his head. The blond man tried to pin his arms at his sides, and as Jason broke free the man's fist connected with his side and a hot, blunt pain exploded across his waist. He cried out. The man must have picked up that stupid little switchblade.

He forced himself to straighten up against the pain as he fought off the onslaught of the men's fists. They didn't know he only had just enough money for a night of drinking on him anyway. All this for a few drinks. It was almost funny.

What wasn't funny was that Jason hadn't seen the man with the baseball bat coming. Stupid fever. And he hadn't even had the chance to get drunk. Frustration and anger fueled his blows and moments later he had the blond man unconscious on the wet pavement.

Jason stepped over him and looked at the other man, bigger, older, and dirtier, baseball bat still clenched in one meaty fist.

Jason stepped forward menacingly, trying not to shake, trying not to press his hand to the wound in his side.

The big man grinned, and then he nodded to someone behind Jason.

Jason's eyes widened as he whipped around, quickly enough that dizziness and a headache rolled over him. Where were these guys coming from?

The new man was smaller, covered in tattoos. Jason had no time to make more observations before the tattooed man and the big man flew at him, aiming punch after punch at his face. What the hell did they expect to get out of this? Why did they think he had money?

He realized that he was all defense, barely getting in a decent hit. His breath was getting quicker, shallower, and it took too much effort not to curl up around the throbbing stab wound.

The two of them managed to shove him against the telephone pole and one of them got in a punch right where the knife had hit him. For a moment he couldn't see anything. He coughed. Was that blood coming out of his mouth? He took another hit, and another, and another, and then he realized he was yelling, but so was someone else.

The big man with the bat had been dragged off him, and lied on the ground a few feet away.

Jason and the tattooed man were both still for a split second, their gazes starting with the unconscious body of the big thug and slowly travelling up to see who had knocked him out.

It was a homeless guy, looming over the big thug. Jason could see stringy red hair swinging from a baseball cap around a sharp, dirty face, gleaming with rain in the yellow streetlight. A sweatshirt ten sizes too big for him flapped in the rain.

"Who the hell are you?" The tattooed man looked back and forth between the newcomer and Jason, whose vision was starting to go black at the edges.

"You know, I'm glad you asked," the homeless man said. He stepped over the unconscious body and moved menacingly towards Jason and the tattooed man, who had turned his back on Jason to face this new man.

Jason's mouth twitched in the semblance of a smile as he reached one arm back behind his belt, his fingers closing around the cool handle of his gun.

"I'm your worst nightmare," the newcomer continued as he flew at the thug, getting in three punches in quick succession. He paused. "No, wait, that's cheesy, hold on-" A powerful kick sent the man flying back onto the cracked sidewalk, just feet away from Jason. "I'm... to hell with this, nobody cares, Roy, you idiot." One more punch and the thug was out.

But Jason didn't need the thug as a distraction anymore, because now he had out his gun. He raised it with shaking hands. It looked like there were two homeless guys in baseball caps, but it must just have been one. He moved the gun back and forth between them. Which one to shoot at first?

"You're right, Roy, nobody cares," he said, his words slurring together. "Now get the hell out of here." He shot at both of them in quick succession, one after the other, and then frowned as a hand swatted the gun out of his grip. He felt strangely adrift without it. He never missed. What the hell was going on? This stupid fever. Or concussion. Something. He needed his gun. It vaguely dawned on him that maybe he really was in trouble this time.

He tipped his head up and found himself staring up into a dirty, thin face.

"Not even a hint of gratitude? Not even a hint?" the man wailed, pressing a hand to his chest. The scent of dirt and alcohol came off him in waves.

Jason struggled to pull himself up the wall. "Like you beat them up just to help me," he scoffed sarcastically, attempting a laugh that devolved into a wet cough.

Roy walked towards him, steps oddly off kilter. Was he drunk? If he could fight like that when he was drunk, Jason wondered what he was like sober.

"No," Roy said. "I beat them up cause if I didn't have something to knock the lights out of I'd be drinking, and if I was drinking, Waylon would fricking kill me."

"Haven't you already been drinking?"

"What are you talking about? What the hell are you talking about?" Roy demanded, eyes going wide and confused.

"You drunk yourself so shitfaced you forgot?" Jason asked, just about to his feet now. If he could keep the man distracted for another minute he could stand up and get the hell away from-

"You shut the hell up!" A fist slammed into the side of Jason's head and a bright flash of light exploded behind his eyes. His body sprawled out next to the rest of them.


	3. Chapter 3: A Place to Hide

Jason lifted his face an inch off the gritty pavement, out of the frigid puddle. Pain and nausea hit him as soon as he sat up, and the streetlight glared in his eyes. He coughed, and the whole right side of his torso burned. He clenched his jaw and got to his feet.

What was that _smell?_ He took in his surroundings: Bodies lay all around him, and the one closest was lying in a puddle of his own vomit.

Jason scrambled away from the man quickly, scrunching up his face in disgust as the man groaned. Had Roy passed out right after punching Jason? Who the hell _was_ this guy?

Jason stumbled away blearily. It was still mostly dark out. If this had been a night of patrol, he would be heading back right around now. He heard more retching and groaning behind him and then unsteady footsteps, but he didn't look back. He would be happy never to set eyes on the man again. He kept walking with the pace of someone who had just been hit by a car.

"What the fricking _hell?_ " came an incredulous wail from behind him.

Jason didn't look back.

"That's Batman! That's the fricking Batman!"

Jason stopped short.

He turned around to see Roy pointing to the top of a building just a block behind him. The sky was just barely light enough so that Jason could see the very familiar silhouette. He swore explosively and tried to run, pressing a fist into his side.

He couldn't let Bruce see him like this, see that he'd failed like this. They had moments until Bruce spotted them, and the bodies around them, and then, if he came over here… He couldn't let Bruce see him like this, see that he'd failed like this.

Jason scowled as Roy passed him easily. And then the man suddenly stopped.

" _Shit!_ Where the hell am I supposed to go?" he demanded, turning towards Jason with wide eyes.

Jason kept making his way, which unfortunately happened to be in the direction of Roy. He just glared.

Roy continued frantically. "I think we might have killed a few of those assholes! Batman's not cool with that. He might- he might-"

"No, _you_ killed them," Jason growled. "Move out of my way."

Roy stayed right in his face. "Okay okay, just let me stay with you, _one_ morning, just one morning-"

"No!"

"Come on, man, I saved your ass back there, and you gotta have an apartment around here or something- whoah-"

One moment Jason had been right next to Roy, the next, Jason tripped over a beer bottle and didn't get back up.

" _Shit!_ Shit!" Roy crouched next to Jason, frantically shaking him until Jason cracked opened his eyes, screwed up his face in pain.

"Get off me before I make you," he growled.

"Tell me where the hell we can find somewhere to lay low until the Batman gets out of here!" Roy glanced frantically up at the building where the Batman had been. He was on another building now, closer, and still, except for his cape. Roy could feel the blood pounding in his chest, in his head.

"Leave me the hell alone," Jason said stubbornly.

"Listen, I'm not from Gotham, I don't know-"

"I don't give a shit."

Roy set his jaw, and then scooped him up into his arms and started running.

Jason opened his mouth to yell at him. A wave of nausea hit him and he snapped it firmly shut.

"Okay," Roy pointed. "Now give me directions or he'll beat up both of us and leave us for the cops."

Jason hesitated.

"Do you see where he is?" Roy demanded. "If he turns around, he'll _see_ us!"

"Left," he croaked. "No, not that far, _you idiot._ You better fricking put me down before I-"

"You'll slow both of us down!"

"You smell like shit. Go right! No, _right_!"

"Gee, thanks, buddy. You're not looking so hot yourself."

"It's… it's here," Jason said, and as Roy set him down in front of the door, he slumped to the ground. He was unaware of Roy searching him for keys, frantically unlocking the door, and dragging him over the threshold.


	4. Chapter 4: An Unwanted Guest

Jason woke to a loud, tuneless rendition of Bohemian Rhapsody. He swore explosively. Roy should have been long gone by now. He sat up, only slightly dizzy, from where Roy must have dumped him on the couch, and stomped through the apartment, following the noise, to kick the intruder out.

Roy was sitting comfortably on the kitchen floor, a towel wrapped around his waist, red hair clinging to his neck. There was a plate of scrambled eggs balanced delicately on one knee, and a mass of black metal mechanical bits spread out on the floor in front of him. He looked up as Jason stocked in and the song died in his throat. "Uh… mornin'."

Jason's eyes went wide. "What the hell are you doing with my tech?" he said, bending down to snatch it away. "You think that shit grows on trees? No one else has those designs, no one else but-"

"But who?" Roy said, blue eyes gleaming curiously. "Because they're surprisingly decent. Of course, I would never have designed them to be so volatile, with the conductors so near the shell, but-"

Jason stared at him in shock as he continued a long, convoluted rant about the flaws of the Batman's tech, tech Jason had stolen and spent weeks trying to figure out, trying to copy. And this guy knew how to _improve_ them? After looking at them for a few minutes?

"Okay. Who the hell are you?" Jason interjected.

Roy looked smug. "Who's asking?"

"I'm- none of your business. You're in my house, you answer my questions." He crossed his arms. "And I never said you could use my shower."

"You call this dump a house?" Roy raised his eyebrows, looking around at the leak-stained, cracked walls and the peeling linoleum floor.

"You don't like it, you can get the hell out. Hobo," he tacked on, immaturely, but this guy was getting on his nerves.

"Hey, I had a place. And a job. And..."

"And?"

"And a pretty sweet arsenal of weapons."

"So what made you into a drunk hobo in Gotham?"

Roy bristled, choosing to finish the eggs before they got cold rather than grace this rude person with an answer.

Jason frowned when he realized and answer wasn't forthcoming. "Those eggs have been in the fridge for weeks."

"Thought they tasted kinda funny," Roy said, continuing to shovel them in. Finally he stood and stretched, adjusting Jason's only towel around his waist.

"Got any meds?" he asked. "I got a hell of a hangover."

" _No,_ " Jason lied crisply. "You need to leave. Put on some damn clothes and get out of my apartment." He stepped forward menacingly. "I don't know how much of last night you remember, but you don't wanna see how I can shoot when my vision's straight."

"Wait wait wait wait, just wait a minute," Roy said, raising his hands. "You got all of this shit in your apartment, obviously you're into the whole..." he hesitated, looking up at his host carefully. This thin young man with shocks of white in his dark hair could be anyone. Best not to use the word _vigilante_ just yet. "Uh… hurting people thing. I can help you out there. I can make you a lot more of this shit, and better. I just a need a place to crash for a day or two. And a fresh set of clothes."

Jason scowled. The kind of guy who would waltz into someone else's apartment and use their shower was not the kind of entitled jerk Jason wanted to stay with, even short term. He liked living alone. If he had wanted people breathing down his neck, criticizing him, and monitoring his every move, he would have moved back in with Bruce. And _that_ was never going to happen.

On one hand, this guy was just what Jason needed to give him an edge as Red Hood. Who else could do better than Bruce's tech? But he was a stranger. It just wasn't worth the risk.

"No," Jason said finally. "How the hell do you expect me to trust-"

A loud knock at the flimsy apartment door stopped him short. "Jason!" a deep voice rumbled through the room, barely muffled. "I know this is one of your safehouses. If you don't wanna open the door, I'll remove it."

Roy stood up, leaving the his plate on the floor. So that was his name. Jason. Currently Jason was pressing himself against the wall, looking like he wanted to disappear into it, his face sweaty and pale.

"Who is that?" Roy mouthed.

Jason just shook his head and pushed himself away from the wall, stumbling out of the room, which struck Roy as completely idiotic. Jason was probably too dazed to realize how much trouble he could be in. Roy adjusted his towel and stepped up towards the door, rolling his neck before pulling it open.

"Hyello?" he drawled, looking curiously at the very big, very well dressed man on Jason's doorstep.

The man frowned down at him. "This is Jason Todd's apartment," he said, absolutely sure of himself.

"Who's Jason?" Roy asked curiously, scratching his head. "You wanna let me get dressed, and then I can call the cops and tell them some weirdo is trying to knock down my door?"

"Wrong apartment," the man snapped, and turned on his heel. Roy thought he looked vaguely familiar.

Roy slammed the door shut. "I got rid of him. You can come out now," he said, and turned to see Jason standing behind the couch, his knuckles white around a gun.

"Well shit," Roy said, slowly pushing Jason's hands and the gun down. "Thought you ran and hid, Mr. Jason Todd _._ "

Dread mingled with relief in Jason's expression. Bruce was gone, but this stranger- this stranger with a skill set that definitely wasn't normal- knew his name.

"I thought I was gonna have to..." he trailed off breathlessly, shoving his gun back into his waistband, looking at Roy with a dazed look that slowly settled into a clear-headed smirk. "That little act was actually pretty decent, for my well-being. But now he knows your face. Maybe not so smart for yourself."

He dropped himself onto the couch. Either way, Roy was obviously a quick thinker, even as hungover as he must be.

"Who the hell was he?"

"Who the hell was _Batman?_ " Jason snapped. "He's not exactly that hard to recognize, even though it is weird he's going around during the day."

Finally Roy remembered where he had seen the man's face before. It was in tabloids, on the news. "That was Bruce Wayne," he realized slowly. "Why the hell did you hear his voice and think it was Batman? That's not even Batman's voice. And why the hell would _Batman_ be looking for you? And why the hell do you think you know Batman well enough to recognize a voice that's not even his trademark voice?"

When Roy looked back at Jason the gun was pointed right up at his face.

"He's not Batman, okay? You got it? I made a mistake, that's all. Tell anyone that he's Batman and I'll fucking kill you." The words spilled out of Jason's mouth as he slowly rose off of the couch, keeping the gun trained on Roy.

"Whoa whoa whoa, okay, you got it." So much for a place to crash for a few days, much less some kind of ally- what the hell did he think he could have got out of hanging out with Jason, anyway? No one in this kind of life had _friends._

Roy left Jason and his gun in the living room and rushed back to the bathroom to pull on his jeans, leaving the much dirtier sweatshirt on the floor. He gave Jason a wary look as he came back into the living room, towel now around his shoulders like a blanket.

"Welp. You're welcome for saving your ass. Twice. See you around." He pulled the front door open and would have stepped out if Jason hadn't grabbed his shoulder.

"You are not going anywhere with that infor-"

Roy grabbed Jason's wrist and twisted, shoving him backwards into the apartment and slamming the door behind him before darting out into the street.

 **AN** : I'm sorry about the sporadic (that's an understatement) updates, but I hope to have the next chapter up tonight or tomorrow!


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